This Week: Suspended

Introduction  

Jack: Hello my name’s Jack and welcome to our weekly round-up section called ‘This Week’ on Premier Skills English.

Rich: Hi there. I’m Rich. We’ve got lots of interesting words and phrases to help you talk about football in English.

Jack: We want you to use and practise these phrases by interacting with Premier League fans from around the world in our comments section.

Rich: If you listen to us on Apple Podcasts, you can leave your comments in the review section. We do read all the reviews and would love to hear from you.

Jack: You can find all our latest content on the Premier Skills English homepage or the Premier Skills-British Council Facebook page. 

Rich: Don’t forget that we also have our weekly Premier Skills English Podcast that is released every Friday. Every week we help you with some different vocabulary or an aspect of grammar.

Jack: Our latest podcast is called Learning Vocabulary: Road to Recovery. We look at words and phrases connected to injury, illness and getting better. You can find the lesson on the Premier Skills English homepage, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and most other podcast platforms now. 

Headlines 

Jack: Coronavirus shuts down Premier League. 

Rich: All Premier League football has been suspended due to the Covid-19 crisis spreading throughout the world. Premier League players and managers are amongst many that have been directly affected by the virus and placed themselves in self-isolation. The Premier League currently hopes to return on April fourth but this is subject to medical advice and conditions at the time. 

Jack: Premier League advice to fans. 

Rich: In the current situation, the National Health Service in the UK has encouraged everyone to maintain good hygiene to avoid spreading the virus. This includes regular hand washing and avoiding close contact with people who are unwell. If someone shows symptoms which include a high temperature and a cough they are encouraged to stay at home and self-isolate.

Jack: Clubs donate to their communities.

Rich: After the last-minute postponements of Premier League matches, clubs were left with thousands of food items that had been prepared for match day. Clubs including Liverpool, Tottenham and Manchester City have been donating this food to homeless charities and soup kitchens in their local communities.

Jack: This virus is going to challenge us all. The news is full of difficult stories about people having really hard times in places like, China,  Italy and Spain, but if you keep watching, there are positive stories too. 

Rich: Some people seem to have gone a bit crazy in the UK and are trying to buy all the toilet paper, but lots of people are staying positive. It’s really reassuring to see how many people are trying to help in their communities.

Vocabulary alert

Rich: In our vocabulary alert, we look at some words and phrases that we used in the headlines.

Jack: Our six words and phrases this week are: Covid-19, suspended, hygiene, self-isolate, homeless charities and local communities.

Rich: In the first headline, we said that the Premier League has shut down or stopped because of coronavirus or Covid-19. Is there a difference between the two - coronavirus and Covid-19.

Jack: Well Coronavirus is the virus and Covid-19 is the disease. To be more specific we talk about types of coronavirus. SARS and Swine Flu and Bird flu were other coronaviruses.

Rich: Coronaviruses are viruses which affect the respiratory system. Our respiratory system is what helps us breathe. What about Covid-19? What does it stand for?

Jack: Covid-19 stands for Coronovirus disease 2019.

Rich: We said that the Premier League has been suspended because of Covid-19.

Jack: To suspend something means to officially stop something from happening. 

Rich: Let’s move on to the second headline. We said that the health service in the UK has encouraged everyone to maintain good hygiene. This is a word we’re hearing a lot at the moment - hygiene.

Jack: Hygiene is connected to keeping ourselves and the things around us clean. It is often used in the context of preventing illnesses and viruses.

Rich: We’re hearing a lot about good personal hygiene at the moment. We’re hearing a lot about the importance of washing our hands for example.

Jack: In the second headline, we also mentioned the idea of self-isolating. This is a word that I don’t think I’d ever used until a week or so ago and now it’s everywhere.

Rich: To self isolate means to separate yourself from other people. You can self-isolate by staying at home and not seeing other people. It means avoiding contact with other people.

Jack: In the third headline we spoke about Premier League clubs giving food to local causes and charities. We said that some clubs had given food to homeless charities.

Rich: A charity is an organisation that helps people in need or supports a good cause.

Jack: We spoke about a homeless charity. Homeless charities are organisations that help people who are homeless - who don’t have anywhere to live.

Rich: The food was given to charities in the local community. The local community is the people who live in a specific area that is near you.

Jack: I live in a small town called Ludlow. My local community is everyone who lives in Ludlow - my town.

Rich: If we were speaking about a big city like London our local community might be one small area of London - the area where you live - the area which is local to you.

Jack: Now listen again to our headlines. Listen for the six words we have been speaking about. Here are the six words and phrases again.

Rich: The six words and phrases this week are: Covid-19, suspended, hygiene, self-isolate, homeless charities, and local communities.

Jack: Cornovirus shuts down Premier League. (news)

Rich: All Premier League football has been suspended due to the Covid-19 crisis spreading throughout the world. Premier League players and managers are amongst many that have been directly affected by the virus and placed themselves in self-isolation. The Premier League currently hopes to return on April fourth but this is subject to medical advice and conditions at the time. 

Jack: Premier League advice to fans. (action)

Rich: In the current situation, the National Health Service in the UK has encouraged everyone to maintain good hygiene to avoid spreading the virus. This includes regular hand washing and avoiding close contact with people who are unwell. If someone shows symptoms which include a high temperature and a cough they are encouraged to stay at home and self-isolate.

Jack:  Clubs donate to their communities. (good news story)

Rich: After the last-minute postponements of Premier League matches clubs were left with thousands of food items that had been prepared for match day. Clubs including Liverpool, Tottenham and Manchester City have been donating this food to homeless charities and soup kitchens in their local communities.

...

Jack: The news is so full of stories about coronavirus right now, that we thought it would be a good idea to take a look at some of the more difficult language related to the disease to help you if you are struggling to understand the news.

Rich: We’ve spoken a bit about this already but what is a virus?

Jack: A virus is a microorganism that is so small that you can’t see it without a microscope. A virus lives in people, animals and plants and causes disease.

Rich: Viruses such as coronaviruses are contagious. This is another word I’ve been seeing a lot - contagious.

Jack: Contagious is used to describe something that can be spread or passed from one person to another. We use the word most often to talk about things like viruses and diseases.

Rich: If a person has the disease, and can pass it on to other people, they are infectious. 

Jack: We say that people are infectious but the disease is contagious. 

Rich: Covid-19 is very contagious which is why people are being asked to stay at home or self-isolate.

Jack: Yes, to stop people becoming infected. If one person has a virus they can infect another person if the virus is contagious. You infect someone with something.

Rich: One problem has been people don’t know they are infected because they have no symptoms.

Jack: That’s right. Some of the symptoms of the virus don’t show up right away they take a few days. That’s why people are being asked to keep away from other people. 

Rich: I’ve seen the phrase social distancing in the news a lot.

Jack: Yes, social distancing means giving people lots of personal space. No kissing, no shaking hands and in queues keeping two metres apart - things like that.

Rich: So we have social distancing which is keeping away from people when you are outside and self-isolating which is staying at home alone.

Jack: People are being asked to self-isolate when they show symptoms of the virus. We mentioned symptoms before …

Rich: Symptoms are changes in your body that show that you are not well.

Jack: Some of the symptoms of Covid-19 include a high temperature or fever and a cough (cough!).

Rich: We’ve looked at a few words and phrases in this section: virus, to infect someone, contagious, infectious, symptoms, cough, fever, social distancing, and self-isolate.

Jack: If you want to check your understanding of these words and phrases, we’ve put more examples and an activity on the Premier Skills English homepage where you will also find the transcript for this lesson.

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Rich: We’re seeing the words we looked at in this lesson a lot in the news recently.

Jack: And we were wondering if there are any words or phrases that you see in the news that you’re not sure about in English.

Rich: If there is a word or phrase that you’d like us to explain or talk about, let us know in the comments section on the Premier Skills English website

Jack: Before we finish we just wanted to say that we hope you found this lesson useful and we hope that all of you stay healthy and we’ll all be back watching Premier League football very soon.

Rich: Bye for now and enjoy your football.